


May We Meet Again

by wrotelucy



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Angst, M/M, Older!Adam AU, Present Meets Future AU, kinda i guess lmao, pynch - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-10
Updated: 2015-01-10
Packaged: 2018-03-07 00:57:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,269
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3154808
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wrotelucy/pseuds/wrotelucy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>based on the prompt: since time is circular, Ronan meets older!Adam in Cabeswater (or vice versa)</p>
            </blockquote>





	May We Meet Again

**“Ronan?”**

Ronan turned towards the voice. The trees wavered, the grass beneath his feet seemed to buzz. Everything was very suddenly very green, seemingly glistening with a fresh coat of dew, a hazy feeling leftover from the sun. The smell of moss and mud was much stronger. But Ronan’s focus was drawn, instead, to the man before him. Unmistakable blue eyes swam in foreign features—greying, evenly cut mousy hair; weathered, lightly tanned skin; calloused and knuckled hands; scruff dusting jaw. He looked like someone, someone with whom Ronan was  _very_  familiar but only…older. 

 **“Parrish?”** Ronan asked the man in front of him who was, very distinctly, middle aged and also, very distinctly, his friend Adam Parrish. Yet in the reality in which Ronan lived, the two didn’t seem to coincide. Or at least, what he had thought of reality. Now, he wasn’t so sure. Adam was supposed to be at Monmouth, helping Gansey study for their next Latin exam. Ronan was supposed to be there, too, but Cabeswater seemed more interesting.

That much was definitely true. 

 **“Oh, God, Ronan,”** choked the man, his eyes glazing slightly as he stepped closer. He reached out a hand, as if to touch Ronan to prove to himself that Ronan was really there. He stopped, leaving a few inches between his fingertips and Ronan’s bare arm, hovering. Ronan didn’t make any move towards or away. The man smiled sadly as he dropped his hand, wiping his palm on his jeans.

 **“Yes, it’s—I’m Adam, and I’m—I’m really glad to see you.”** He faltered, eyes drifting from Ronan’s face and trailing down his frame.  **“I can’t believe it.”**

 **“Yeah, me either, uh—eyes up here old man.”**  Ronan retorted with some amusement, smirking as he crossed his arms over his chest.  **“How old are you anyway?”**

Adam went from looking at Ronan to looking at his feet, face slightly red.  **“Sorry, I’m forty seven and it’s just…it’s really good to see you.”**

Ronan quirked a brow.  **“Been a while, then?”**

Adam looked up, watching Ronan carefully. The laugh lines around his eyes twitched, and Ronan cocked his head to the side as Adam drew a tentative breath.

 **“You have no idea,”** Adam replied, casting his gaze elsewhere as he spoke, shaking his head.

Ronan quirked a brow, stepping forward. Adam attended to the movement, chewing on his lower lip as his eyes found Ronan’s.  **“Is that so,”** Ronan deadpanned.

Adam’s eyes searched Ronan’s face, then roved carefully along his neck, tracing the curves and curls of the tattoo he’d grown so familiar with over the years. It had been years—Adam had almost forgotten the look of it, the feel of it under his fingertips, the haunt of the mysterious black ink and the dangerous boy that it clung to. He wished, then, that he could touch them. To feel close to Ronan again, to hold onto him, them, for maybe just a minute more, maybe just—

Ronan cleared his throat and Adam’s eyes flashed back to Ronan’s face, which was tinted slightly pink. Adam suppressed a smile.

 **“I’m dead, aren’t I,”** Ronan said it like it wasn’t a question.

Adam shut his eyes, knowing all too well just how much it wasn’t.

 **“I don’t…I can’t—”** Adam started, stuttered and stopped, heaving a sigh. Then:  **“I should go.”**

Adam opened his eyes. Ronan’s stance had changed—his arms were at his sides, his fists clenching and unclenching, his lips pursed, lids lowered as he looked at some spot on the ground between them. His jaw flexed, and Adam watched the nerve jump from his neck, brushing his cheekbone, and settling—a wave washing over the sea.

Adam often came to Cabeswater after Ronan died. It helped him feel closer to Ronan. But this was not what he wanted.

 **“I should…I need to go,”** Adam offered, again, as he took a few steps backwards.  **“It was nice to see you ag—”**

 **“What year is it,”** Ronan asked, voice low, still not looking at Adam. Adam tenses.  **“Where you’re from?”**

Adam paused, considering, watching the boy before him. Ronan looks up, blue eyes fierce as ever, jaw working to grind his teeth. He almost looks angry, but Adam’s long learned in reading Ronan Lynch. This wasn’t anger, not really. It was something much worse, something that made Adam’s insides twist. Something that Adam had known, well once, and something he had never expected to see on Ronan Lynch—at least, this, young, handsome, daring, Ronan Lynch. But there it was, painted in all the hollows of his cheeks, the brightness of his eyes, his pointed chin.

_Fear._

Adam, of course, can’t offer a sort of comfort save an ill-fitting joke.

 **“Still the mathematician I remember you as, I see,”** He notes with half-hearted sarcasm. 

Ronan didn’t seem to hear him, at any rate.

 **“How long have I been dead,”** Ronan pressed, his voice reaching cataclysm levels of quiet. Adam swallowed.  **“How did it happen—how—how did I die?”** He finished, a slight tremor in his voice as he searched Adam’s eyes.

 **“Ronan,”** Adam said, a note of caution in his voice. He stepped forward, then, shoving his hands into the pockets of his coat, keeping his hands certainly to himself.  **“You know I can’t tell you about it.”**

Ronan swallowed, closing his eyes.

 **“Will you ever love me back?”**  Ronan asked.

Adam’s lips parted. Cabeswater rustled, and Adam was sure that they were warning Ronan, just like they had all those years before, just as Ronan had told him. Adam hadn’t heard Cabeswater speak for years. At this time, he was almost grateful, considering the pain that sat in the crease between Ronan’s brow.

A few steps, Adam could ease the crease with his thumb. Instead, however, he gripped the insides of his pockets and stood very, very still.

 **“Yes,”** Adam answered.

Ronan let out a breath, loosening his fists. Adam didn’t suppress the smile, this time, and when Ronan opened his eyes, he caught and returned it.

 **“Then, I guess it was all worth it.”** Ronan said, after a pause.

 **“I’ll try—to keep that in mind,”** Adam responded, a bit unsure.

The wind tugged at Adam’s jacket. He blinked.

 **“I have to go,”** Adam said.  **“Or you do.”** He added, frowning. 

 **“Yeah I do,”** Ronan replied, smirking, and looking much more like himself. Adam’s heart warmed. Ronan jammed one hand into the pocket of his jeans, and raised the other into a half-assed wave.

 **“See you later, then, I guess,”** He offered, winking as he turned away, tossing another half-assed wave over his shoulder, which shook with something like laughter. Possibly, it was a sob, but Adam hoped that Ronan was still the Ronan he remembered. 

And that Ronan would be laughing. And still, just as bad with goodbyes. Then again, how could Ronan Lynch even believe in them, after a meeting like this? How could Adam?

 **“See you,”** Adam said, mostly to himself, as Ronan moved out of earshot. The truth was, though, that forty-even year old Adam Parrish would never see Ronan Lynch again, outside of Cabeswater. Clouds rolled overhead. He tried to remember what season it was, back in Henrietta, at this time. It had to be spring.

Adam felt a raindrop touch his forehead. He pulled his jacket more tightly around him, tucking his pockets and the curled fists into his sides. It was winter, back home. Adam watched Ronan Lynch until he disappeared into the tree, and then, finally, turned to go home himself. It was going to be a long winter. 

 

**Author's Note:**

> originally published on my [tumblr](http://babellamy.tumblr.com/post/107515598868/prompt-since-time-is-circular-ronan-meets)
> 
> you just know that ronan is going to die before adam ok
> 
> kudos are love but comments are life


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